During the holiday season, consumers tend to increase their spending. As a result, the end of the year tends to be a high earning season for retail companies, however it’s important to note the key ingredient companies need to reach their full holiday potential: preparation.

Marketers are up against a current reality of tough economic conditions, on top of oversaturated inboxes. Therefore, holiday shopping is predicted to take place earlier this year to soften the impact on consumers’ wallets, meaning it’s more important than ever that email marketers get the right message to the right consumers at the right time. But how? Let’s walk through how email marketers can set themselves up for success this  holiday sales season.

First, the challenges at hand:

Let’s start by outlining the challenges companies will be up against given the state of today’s current market. Preparing to combat these challenges is critical for email marketers to ensure a successful peak season. Ultimately, the following reasons are why we are talking about the holiday email season early and often:

Global email volume continues to rise – in fact, emails are up 4.3% over 2022  with record setting volume projected in the fourth quarter of this year. To paint the full picture, 347 billion emails are sent daily. But 1 in 6 marketing emails is not delivered to inboxes – that is nearly 59 million messages. When sending volume increases (as it does during the holidays), subscriber tolerance decreases for messages which aren’t timely or relevant. In other words, subscribers become much more selective about the messages they will actually engage with.

On top of that, looming economic uncertainty will influence purchase decisions during this peak season. Tough economic conditions decrease subscriber engagement, spending and brand loyalty. Lastly, as rapidly changing technology and email access shift with new devices and standards, businesses must update their email marketing strategies to keep up.

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Now for the action companies can take:

1. Lay the groundwork for your IP or domain

It’s common for senders to dramatically increase their email volume and frequency during the holiday season. However, these sudden changes act as red flags for mailbox providers who may block messages until they are able to validate a sender’s reputation. To avoid delivery delays or spam placement, senders can warm up their IPs or domains in advance.

During an IP or domain warmup, a sender slowly increases their message volume to the mailbox provider. This gradual increase in sending volume builds a meaningful reputation between senders and mailbox providers. Sender reputation is a critical component of mailbox provider filtering decisions, and can determine whether messages land in the inbox, the spam folder, or are rejected.

A few additional tips for strengthening email deliverability before peak season:

• Verify all new email addresses
• Send only to active and engaged subscribers
• Permission new subscribers using double opt-in methods
• Pre-screen all content for spam-like factors before sending
• Make it easy to unsubscribe. Include clear links to your unsubscribe page in email headers
• Promptly remove hard bounces, opt-outs, and complaints from your active list

2. Leverage the power of personalization

Email marketers don’t have long to capture subscribers‘ attention. According to a  study by Microsoft, the human attention span has reduced from 12 to 8 seconds over the past two decades. Subscribers scanning through crowded inboxes are making split-second decisions about which messages they open.

To grab subscriber attention and remain relevant throughout the peak sales season, senders need to optimize personalization capabilities. A key tactic for personalization is layering subscriber’s email preference center choices with first-party data. For reference, ethically collected first-party data is generated directly from consumers based on their behavior and direct interactions with a brand. Think of things like transaction history, demographic information, or behavioral data. Those using first-party data for key marketing functions see up to a 2.9x revenue uplift and a 1.5x increase in cost savings, based on a study from Think With Google and Boston Consulting Group.

A great example to consider is a makeup brand sending tips for how to use a makeup product which a customer purchased. First-party data can be utilized for a variety of things, including targeting, upselling, segmentation, customer retention, marketing attribution, and ROI analysis.

3. Stay in the know with the latest technology:

AI is currently flooding the technology space and a lot of marketers are trying to figure out how to harness the power of AI to create more meaningful, customized experiences. Many are testing AI on a variety of marketing tasks such as hyper-personalization, subject line optimization, copywriting and graphics, performance data analysis, list segmentation, and customer service responses.

There have never been more tools available to email marketers to ensure that their strategies  are up to date (which in turn ensures higher engagement – and thus higher inbox placement). Take time to research the newest tools and trends and evaluate how they can improve and optimize your program. Investing in the right tools can have a great impact on up leveling your campaigns and establishing subscriber loyalty.

It’s not easy to be an email marketer right now. Between overcrowded inboxes, tough economic conditions, and rapidly changing technology, marketers also face email performance pressures  while trying to stay up-to-date on the latest privacy laws and deliverability best practices. Putting a strong email strategy in place helps mitigate risk and allows marketers to drive subscriber engagement and sales revenue during peak sales season.

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